In the US today, more than 80,000 people - men, women, and children - live up to 23 hours a day in tiny cells without natural light, air, or human contact. Many remain there for months, years, or even decades.

The UN's expert on torture considers more than 15 days in solitary confinement a human rights violation. The US is the only democratic nation that makes widespread use of long-term solitary confinement in its prisons, even for minor, nonviolent infractions as simple as having too many postage stamps.

Is solitary confinement torture? What effect does it have on the people who endure it?

While many of these seem too absurd to be true, they reflect actual infractions given to individuals in New York State prisons that landed them two weeks or more in solitary confinement. You can find the correlating violation in the Standards of Inmate Behavior Booklet (February 2006) using the violation codes. Want to spread awareness on this issue? "Ticket" your friends on Facebook.